uyuni to la paz bus

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Hola -
We are now in La Paz, Bolivia staying at a beautiful hotel just up the hill from Plaza San Francisco in the midst of the market area of the city. on the streets they are selling everything: toilets, screws, chickens, ducks, unknown cuts of meat, a thriving black market and a fascinating witches market. the witches market sells llama fetuses used to bless a new house and strange mixtures to cast a spell and of course sacks and sacks of coca leaves.

Our bus ride up was one to remember. we boarded in Uyuni at 8pm expecting to arrive around 7:30am. The buses here are just a bit different than in Chile. The tires looked fit to go war. The bus had about a two foot clearance and for some reason rather than putting the luggage in the storage spaces on the underside they were strapped to the roof and covered with a tarp. As we finished our dinner curb side i asked the driver if there was a bathroom on board (as there always was on Chile's long distance buses.) His response, oh no, but just knock on the front door when you need to and the bus driver will pull over for you! Considering my BM's are still out of wack this was a little troublesome. The first 5 hours were on a dirt/rock road. bumping our way along at 20-40mph it began to rain. The rain quicly turned to downpour and our wonderful dirt road turned into a river of mud. An added benefit was that rather than having two headlights pointing forward the front right pointed directly off to the side giving us a great view of the mud river.

About two hours in my stomach took a turn for the worse...a deep churning and rumbling. every bump sent a pain into my stomach and a gag to my mouth. I started sweating and pressed my head against the freezing window for comfort. having no interest in stopping the bus to squat in the downpour i thought i would wait until absolutely the last minute. thank goodness 30 minutes later it was time for our one and only 15 minute stop. The little roadside cafe was filled with other travelers and luckely the bathroom was open. I ran inside armed with my toilet paper. (no bathrooms here come with toilet paper...even the ones you pay for.)

After our stop i felt a million times better and was actually able to get a few hours of sleep.

La Paz is amazing. They have a bit of a smog problem but besides that it's beautiful. (and i'm tall here!) We plan to stay until wednesday then catch a flight up to Rurrenabaque (the bus option is 22 hours - give or take 6 hours.) In Rurre, as they call it, we will head up-river 5 hours to the Chalalan eco-lodge for a few nights in the jungle.

I hope this finds everyone well.

Take care

oh, and i think i've official given up on trying to post photos. i'm unable to downsize them and to load them at the current size takes forever.

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